GroupDynamics

=Team Scene Charades= by Katie Oristian Palacios

Purpose
Team Scene Charades can be played as an ice breaker, a team builder, and/or a class exercise.
 * **Team Building:** Team Scene Charades is a good activity to get small groups working together quickly.
 * **Ice Breaker:** This game can be used to get people feeling comfortable with each other and get the group laughing.
 * **Class Exercise:** Vocabulary words or class concepts could be used as "scenes" as a fun way to get students practicing and remembering course content.

Time Required
Depending on the size of the group, this entire activity takes between 35 - 75 minutes.

Number of Participants
This activity works best with 16 people (4 teams of 4 people). It requires at least 6 people (2 teams of 3 people), but could work with as many as 24 people (6 teams of 4 people).

Supplies Needed
Optional: A marker and something to write on that is visible to the whole group. (Large pad of paper, Whiteboard, Blackboard). These supplies are only necessary if you want to keep score during the activity.

Preparation
Depending on the purpose of the group's gathering, the facilitator must prepare by creating the "scenes" that the teams will be acting out together. Some scenes should be easier to act out with the additional people, and others should be more difficult to act out with more people. Scenes consist of just a couple of words, and should be printed out on strips of paper that can be distributed to teams.


 * Possible scenes for a language class:**
 * Watching a tennis match
 * Watching a movie
 * Playing piano
 * Playing hockey
 * Climbing a tree
 * Making a sandwich
 * Calling a taxi


 * Possible scenes for a holiday party:**
 * Rudolph
 * Santa's Elves
 * 12 days of Christmas
 * I saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus
 * Festival of Lights


 * Possible scenes for a work/department event:**
 * Making copies
 * Budget
 * A job interview
 * Writing an email
 * A meeting
 * Lunch break
 * Morning commute
 * Coffee break
 * Getting a raise
 * The holiday party

Facilitator Introduction
//Facilitator first breaks the group into teams, and then gives the following introduction.//

Welcome to Team Scene Charades!

How many of you have heard of the game Charades? (Participants raise hands.) In Charades each participant silently acts out a scene and gets the audience members to guess what they are acting out. Today you will all be acting out scenes related to , after all that's why we are all here together today. While you are silently acting out the scenes in the front of the room, the audience members will be watching and shouting out their guesses to the scenes that you are acting out. Sounds simple enough, right? But wait- there's a small catch.

You will be acting out the silent scenes //with your team.// As a team you will be getting the audience to guess the scene that you are all acting out together. Just like in Charades, when acting out the scene you must remain completely silent. Since this is //Team Scene Charades//, each group member must be //touching at least one other group member throughout the entire scene//. So the team unit cannot break apart while acting out the scene. As a team, you can decide how best to work together to act out the scene in a single team unit. I will be handing out your team's scenes, and you will have a few minutes to quickly plan and rehearse your team's scenes together. Then we'll get back into our big group, and see if we can guess each team's scenes. //Remember, you must be touching at least one other group member throughout the entire scene and you must remain silent.//

I will now begin passing out the team scenes to each group. Once your group has received its scenes, you can huddle together and look at the scenes that you will be presenting. You will have 10 minutes to quickly and quietly rehearse the scenes before show time. Use the time wisely to plan how your team will work together.

Team Scene Charades - The Process
Use a size-appropriate technique to break the participants up into teams of 3-4 people. (Have the participants count-off, or have them form groups of 3-4 people on their own.)
 * 1. Breaking up into teams** //(4 minutes)//

The facilitator gives the introduction to the activity. (See above "Introduction" section).
 * 2. Facilitator Introduction** //(2 minutes)//

The facilitator distributes the prepared strips of paper with printed scenes to each team. Each team should receive 3-4 scenes.
 * 3. Scene Distribution** //(2 minutes)//

Teams are given time to plan how they will work together as a unit to act out the scene. They can split off and find a space where they can quickly and quietly practice their scenes together.
 * 4. Team Rehearsal** //(10 minutes)//

Each team comes to the front of the room to act out their scenes to the audience. The facilitator acts as "judge", making sure that teams do not lose contact and stay silent. As the team acts out the scene, the facilitator listens for the correct answer from the audience. The facilitator prompts the acting team to move onto the next scene once the audience has correctly guessed. Teams take turns coming to the front of the room to present their sometimes quite unwieldy and humorous team scenes.
 * 5. Show Time** //(8-10 minutes per group)//

Variations

 * Team Scenes is harder when teams must work together on the spot. So try removing the team rehearsal from the activity.
 * For a competitive game, points can be tallied and one team declared a winner.
 * 1 point is awarded to the team if the audience guesses your scene
 * 1 point is awarded to the team of the audience member who guesses a scene correctly

Debrief
Teams will have taken different approaches to the requirement of acting together as a unit. Some teams may just touch each other, and have one member of the team leading them as the actor. Other teams might all participate in the acting- either as separate units or as one team unit. It is interesting to see how the teams respond to the "team unit" requirement, and it's a good way to get people discussing team work, leadership, planning, and execution together. Some questions to get the group to reflect on the activity follow:

1. Were some things more difficult than others to act out as a group? 2. Did you notice some groups that had different or better strategies than others? (Acted together as a unit, or acted as separate touching units) 3. Which team showed the most unity in their scenes? 4. Which team worked as separate units? 5. How well were you able to execute the plans that you rehearsed? Did they work?

Credits
Team Scene Charades was adapted from the more familiar game of "Charades", where individuals act out movie titles, song lyrics, etc.